MY NAME IS JAMES, AND I'M YOUR WAITER: And have some questions. How many Oak Park trustees does it take to pass an ordinance? Four. How many meetings? Don't ask. How can we speed up meetings? Hire "flappers" to slap a trustee when he or she talks too long, as they slapped the people of Laputa in Gulliver's Travels when they got lost in thought. They used a sort of beanbag amd hit them gently on the mouth when it was time to speak, on the ear when it was time to listen. We could do that, slapping on the mouth when it's time to shut up. We would pay the market rate for this service.
Meanwhile, some trustees seem unimpressed with money problems as regards the $5 million fixer-upper on Lake Street and the $6-$9 million needed to fix it up. We'll make it up with tourism, says one. Don't push "numbers" at me, says another. Is she equally dismissive of financial data in running her own affairs?
As for tourism, here's an idea: Empty out the Colt building, breaking leases if need be, close it up and charge admission to look inside. Put a man out front-"Ladies and gentlemen, children of all ages, come one, come all, see the famous Colt building!" Again, make it the market rate for tickets, but only after a series of meetings with plenty of citizen input.
FERVENT PRAYER: Give us developers to match our feisty Oak Park trustees. News flash: Prayer answered, they're here! One drives a hard bargain on property, village fathers and mothers call his bluff or slouch toward calling it, he shows a straight flush, and down the TIF toilet goes $5 million. He knew what he was doing. Did village fathers and mothers know what they were doing?
Another, recently fined for using unsightly bricks, says he may sell his holding at a major corner. Has too much to do, he says. The village fathers and mothers, having devoted many hours to thwarting a third much less ambitious developer because neighbors objected, must sit and watch.
ELECTION ISSUES: Some may be tempted to solve their Dimmycrats for Corruption problem by casting no vote in the Cook County presidency race. Neither the Democrat Stroger nor the Republican Peraica gets a vote, so poignant is the problem facing Ds as explained in this space-vote for corruption and Democrat, staying in the comfort zone, or for supposed reform and Republican, leaving it.
However, it's not a new problem. Star-gazers and job-seekers go all the way with LBJ or up the pike with I-like-Ike. Others go without enthusiasm for whoever's left after slating and primary. It's a terrible way to run a country but the best we have found so far. This is not to endorse the holier-than-thouness of voters who "hold [their] noses" while voting. They are elitists or flirt with elitism. But at least they choose.
SCHOOL MONEY: Expect no "longer-term solutions" to school budget problems, said the District 97 finance man at a recent meeting, splashing cold water on the hope expressed by a board member. Cut costs and prepare for a referendum "every 5-10 years," he advised. Indeed, school board financial planning is "enormously complex," a onetime board member told me. You don't know until September at the earliest what taxes and state aid will get you, and this for a fiscal year that starts July 1.
Neither do you know your costs because September's enrollment determines staffing levels. Nor teacher salaries, affected as they are by graduate credits earned in the summer, not to mention contract-negotiating uncertainties when that applies. So a district makes its best guess and calls it a budget. As for some sort of community effort at school finances, that's asking for trouble. What school board, for instance, wants help from someone who dismisses financial data as mere numbers?
